What to wear: Men – jeans or nice trousers and a shirt; women – jeans and a smart top or a smart dress

Ambience: French, chandeliers, smart/casual, buzzy

Course of the meal: Poussin grille, garlic lemon confit

If I could change one thing: More innovative main courses

Review:

My partner Owl is a big fan of the “spontaneous Michelin” which is where you are out doing something else and then just ‘happen’ to decide to go to a Michelin restaurant because you don’t have anything in the house and, as I’m setting out to prove with some of the posts on this blog, they are often better value than ‘normal’ chain restaurants. One of our spontaneous visits was to Brasserie Chavot.

This is a pleasant, bustling French restaurant in Mayfair which will give you all the French food you could need, from snails to bread to cheese to fondue to onion soup. We both enjoyed the meal a lot, but I would say it lacks the inspiration or standout dishes (at least among the ones we tried) to earn it 4 of my hoots. However, it’s well worth a visit if you’re in the area and it would be good for groups of friends or family as well as for dates.